Residential gateways are widely used to connect devices in a home of a customer to the Internet or any other wide area network (WAN). Residential gateways use for example digital subscriber line (xDSL) technology that enables a high data rate transmission over copper lines, high-speed wireless communication or optical fiber broadband transmission systems. Home networks have become part of everyday life for many end users. A home network consists of a range of heterogeneous components which means that the home network is made up of different kinds of devices. All these devices need to communicate with each other and the Internet.
A generic residential gateway, as used for home networks, includes typically a microprocessor, a non-volatile memory, in which an operating system with software modules and applications is stored, and a volatile memory for the operation of the residential gateway. The operating system of the residential gateway is for example a LINUX operating system and a gateway-specific middleware, which represents an execution environment for the applications. The software modules provide for example a DSL modem function, a cable or an optical modem function, gateway and switching functions, FXS functions, VoIP functionality, and include a Wi-Fi node for a wireless operation and an Ethernet bridge.
A residential gateway has to manage therefore a multitude of different media streaming technologies and there is often a mismatch in the transport protocols between different media interactors. For example, VoIP (voice over Internet Protocol) uses RTP/RTCP (Real-time Transport Protocol/RTP Control Protocol) packets, FXS/FXO (Foreign Exchange Service/Foreign eXchange Office) uses media samples coming from a DSP (digital signal processor), and answering machines use files that need to be played/stored, etc. Linking the different transport protocols from one type to another is often a complex and individual implementation.
US20050190743 discloses a residential gateway comprising a plurality of protocol handlers and a plurality of operation modules in communication with each of the protocol handlers. A first protocol handler is associated with a given customer protocol or service provider protocol and is configured to convert input signals in conformance with the associated protocol to a generic information format. A second protocol handler is further configured to convert information from the generic information format to output signals in conformance with a second, associated protocol. One of the operation modules connects the first protocol handler with the second protocol handler and is configured to perform a telecommunications operation using information in the generic information format.